World

Why Women Can't Get Enough of Turkey's Prime Minister

A young girl waves an AKP flag during a March 2014 election rally in Istanbul.

Image: Jodi Hilton for Mashable

By Emily Feldman2014-07-29 15:00:47 UTC

ISTANBUL, Turkey — On a recent Friday evening, Turkey's Prime Minister, Recep Tayyip Erdogan, was met by hundreds of supporters at one of his first campaign events in Istanbul since announcing his bid to run for president.

Busloads of fans jammed into a seaside park to catch a glimpse of their beloved leader, while his closest allies—a cadre of glammed-up celebrities, politicians from his Justice and Development Party (AKP) and its young, social media-savvy foot soldiers—dined in a walled-off section, snapping selfies.

Despite accusations of corruption, Erdogan remains one of the most popular leaders in Turkish history, with about 50% of popular support, and much more amongst religious youth.

Image: Jodi Hilton for Mashable

Many were stylish young women, who drifted from table to table, exchanging cards and phone numbers with other guests. As the evening wound down, Erdogan left in the back of a black sedan, driving past a table of women who became suddenly starstruck.

“God bless you!” one woman shouted. Her daughter, a university student in a hot pink blouse and hijab spun around to catch a glimpse for herself. “I have goosebumps, look!” she said, pulling up her sleeve to show a friend. “Me too!” the friend replied, both women laughing giddily as he went on his way.

Erdogan is mobbed by AKP supporters as he leaves an AKP event.

Image: Jodi Hilton for Mashable

Despite his reputation as a hardline conservative, Turkey's Prime Minister has the staunch support of many modern, independent women. Legions who were raised in the era of Erdogan have rallied behind the only prime minister they can recall, becoming a powerful political weapon as he attempts his boldest political move to date: capping three terms as prime minister with a run for president.

Erdogan's ardent fans have stuck by his side through the most tumultuous year of his tenure, taking to social media to fend off attackers and persuade voters to cast their ballots for Erdogan on Aug. 10, in what will be the country's first-ever presidential election decided by the people rather than parliament.

"I love Erdogan," said Tuba Bayraktar-Kim, a 33-year-old attorney who attended the campaign dinner. She added that Erdogan's supporters are not the out-of-touch rubes the opposition suggests. “I graduated from a good university, I speak three languages and I'm married to a foreigner.”

She is impressed by the economic leaps Turkey has taken since Erdogan came to power more than a decade ago—with per capita income nearly tripling and modern infrastructure transforming its crowded cities—and considers him a leader on par with the great sultans of the Ottoman Empire.

Supporters of the AKP, the party of Turkey's prime minister, Recep Tayyip Erdogan.

Image: Jodi Hilton for Mashable

As much as he arouses devotion, however, Erdogan also inspires deep rancor. Critics accuse him of trampling democracy to push his conservative values on a country divided between religion and secularism. Last summer, protesters rose up against Erdogan in the biggest anti-government movement the country had seen in decades, kicking off a year of turmoil that seemed at times destined to do him in.

Just when the so-called Gezi protests quieted down, former Erdogan allies began pumping social media with audio leaks that, if legitimate, link him and members of his inner circle to widespread corruption. In response, he shut down Twitter and YouTube—a move that the AKP's digitally connected youth largely defended as necessary.

Yet to the surprise of the opposition, who saw in every new scandal the end of the Erdogan era, his party emerged from local elections in March virtually unscathed, paving the way for his presidential bid.

An enormous billboard calling for the election of longtime Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan, who after three terms in office, is now running for the presidency. The sign says "Target: 2023, 2053, 2071' referring to the AK Party's hopes to remain in office far into the future.

Image: Jodi Hilton for Mashable

The devotion of Erdogan's young supporters is striking. Women scream, snap photos and weep at his rallies, lending them the feeling of a rock concert. Supporters describe him simultaneously as a member of their extended family and a living legend, who will go down in Turkish history as the greatest leader since Ataturk (the founder of the Turkish Republic) or Mehmed the Conqueror (who brought Islam to the region and ended the Byzantine Empire).

Sena Baran, the university student with the goosebumps, describes a love for Erdogan so deep in her family that prayers are regularly uttered for God to take years off their lives and give them to the prime minister.

Coming from a religious household, she grew up listening to stories from another era—the pre-Erdogan days when women with headscarves were outcasts in society, barred from entering universities, practicing politics or being full members of civic life. Erdogan's efforts to eliminate a long-standing headscarf ban allowed women such as Baran to live a full life without compromising belief.

Sena Baran, a leader in the AK Party youth branch and university student, center, prays during a AK Party sponsored iftar (feast to break the fast during Ramadan) in Istanbul.

While religious women remain a critical source of support for the AKP, so, too, do Turks who see the party as a path toward prosperity. “A lot of families owe their their upward social mobility to the AK Party,” says Ozgur Unluhisarcikli, the director of the Ankara office of the U.S. German Marshall Fund.

Given that Turkey's single party government is very powerful, young people see membership as a way into both public and private sector jobs, he said.

Members of the party's youth branch—a two million-member network present at almost every university in the country—are well organized and active on Twitter, marking their presence felt via hashtags such as #wewillnotgiveupErdogan. (The original hashtag is in Turkish.) Leading up to the elections, youth branch members—40 percent of whom are women—are mixing social media activism with traditional door-knocking, to spread the Erdogan gospel.

“Erdogan will succeed because he has a vision” Baran says. “And his goals are not for him — they're for us.”

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